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mrbiceps

Taking a free packed rig to terminal

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With a tail pocket and a primary stow, it will work.

-Be certain you use a good 6 bight of line in the primary stow.
-The stow should also be pulled up tight against the slider to keep in in place until line stretch.
My grammar sometimes resembles that of magnetic refrigerator poetry... Ghetto

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Tailpocket? I either a) don't understand what a tailpocket has to do with free-packing or, b) I don't understand what you guys consider a free-pack is. Explanation, please?
My reality and yours are quite different.
I think we're all Bozos on this bus.
Falcon5232, SCS8170, SCSA353, POPS9398, DS239

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What about the direct stow? Just looking for another opinion. I have heard both sides of the argument. Some say it slows down he deployment others say it causes a slingshot effect.
"If this post needs to be moderated I would prefer it to be completly removed and not edited and butchered into a disney movie" - DorkZone Hero

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Freepacking in this case would be packing the canopy into the container with out the canopy being in a deployment bag. You need something to control the lines so a Tailpocket is the ideal choice to maintain an orderly deployment.

BASE pack jobs are freepacked and some CRW canopies are set up to be freepacked.
Yesterday is history
And tomorrow is a mystery

Parachutemanuals.com

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Sorry pjc, i should have been more specific. I didn't meant the primary stow, i meant the direct stow, or essentially using a rubber band attached to one of the lines to take a bite of the slider and hold it up longer.
"If this post needs to be moderated I would prefer it to be completly removed and not edited and butchered into a disney movie" - DorkZone Hero

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yes its a base canopy so i will be using a tailpocket.



I have thousands of terminal jumps on a free packed main with a tail pocket for the lines.
Cruiseair, Pegasus, Turbo, X-210
No problems.
I think I started using a bag when I got a PD-170 around 1995 or so.

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.
Make It Happen
Parachute History
DiveMaker

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You realize that the whole purpose of a BASE canopy is to open fast, right?




So not true... at all...

The desirable qualities of a BASE canopy are to open consistently, open on heading, and open every time.

Consistency is the most desirable quality for a BASE canopy. Fast openings are not the point.

The purpose of a BASE canopy is to slow you down before your freefall trajectory intersects with the earth.

I can assure you that free-packed BASE canopies, when properly configured for the airspeed at the intended deployment time, open just fine. You can make them open faster or slower if you want, you just need to understand what changes have what effects.

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I can assure you that free-packed BASE canopies, when properly configured for the airspeed at the intended deployment time, open just fine. You can make them open faster or slower if you want, you just need to understand what changes have what effects.



Thanks for the 411 poindexter.

My bet is that a guy who has to ask if you can take a freepacked canopy to terminal is going to have no such information, skill, or ability. On top of that, he's probably going to shoe-horn it into a skydiving rig for the jumps, so the most likely result is going to be a slammer is he takes it all the way.

He significantly reduces the risk of that, injury or damage to the canopy by dumping it with as little airspeed as he can manage.

This isn't about what you could do if given the ideal conditions, it's about what he should do if he's going to jump a canopy and configuration new to him. What you, or any other experienced BASE jumper could do with a BASE specific container is of no consequence to this situation.

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Why would you take it top terminal?



Having confidence in the terminal opening speed when you change slider configurations to sail or small mesh from large mesh is a fine idea.

Working down to 500 - 1000' wing suit deployments before you need to open that low seems like a fine idea to me.

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You realize that the whole purpose of a BASE canopy is to open fast, right? Just jump and dump it from 2500 ft, any higher and you'll be under canopy forever.



2050' hop and pops comply with BSRs for 'C' and 'D' license holders.

I have no clue what rules the Aussies have to follow.

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That's all stuff that any reasonably talented BASE jumper could show him in about half an hour.

If the original poster were to simply ask a local BASE jumper, one with terminal BASE experience, for a little help, I'm willing to bet he'd be given information that would help him do the jumps he wants to do...

...or he can be given blanket advice that's not accurate.

So, is it better that he believe that the only safe way to jump a freepacked rig is to dump at low airspeed? Or would he be better off with a little education about the way the BASE canopy behaves and then let him decide for himself?

I can "shoehorn" that canopy into a skydiving rig and still be confident that its going to behave just fine at terminal.

Its a very simple problem of properly sequenced deployment. That's really all it takes to open a BASE canopy at terminal. There's no BASE black magic involved. He just has to know a couple key things to be aware of, and pack accordingly.

Remember the saying, "If you build a man a fire he's warm for a few hour, but if you light a man on fire, he's warm for the rest of his life."

or wait... that's not right, is it?

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There are a lot of 'ifs' in your advice - if you do this, and if you do that, everything should be fine. The problem is that you don't know if he can or will do any of those. Seeing as he's asking for advice online, it's leaning toward him not having a qualifoed BASE jumper looking over his shoulder.

With the information provided, the safer advice was the more conservative adise. If he's going to try this with little information or experience, start off subterminal, and at least keep the airspeed part of the equation on your side.

The truth is that there is a big difference between a practiced and refined pack job into a BASE rig, with minimal folds to the canopy, and no ful length riser covers to deal with, and s-folding a canopy into a rig with freefall style riser covers.

Are you aware that on some rigs, the risers don't clear the covers until the canopy hits line stretch? The bag will lift off, the risers will stay in the pack tray until the canopy is out of the bag. How would this effect a free pakced canopy? How about an asymetrical release of the riser covers?

For a guy not used to handling a packed canopy outside of a bag, the potential for screwing up the pack job goes way up. Not screwing it up to the point of a mal, but it would be easy for the pack job he did to the canopy on the ground to not quite make it folded into the container. This is why I suggested to ease into it, and dump out of the door.

For the record, I learned to freepack doing just what he's talking about. I jumped a Fox out of an old student Racer, and i have to tell you there was a learniing curve for sure. Consistancy was not the way I would describe the first few jumps. I got better, but I was glad to be throwing out at something less than full speed.

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Man up and take a few spankers, you'll figure it out eventually. Ditch the sail slider though as it's rarely ever used in any BASE, in fact im yet to see one. All about the packjob.

Roll the shit out of the 3 cells either side of the centre cell, get that slider nice and tight and get the primary stow on. Good to go.

People always say "i wanna do slider up because I don't want hard openings associated with slider down jumps" but let me tell ya, a good slider up opening has rocked my world way more than ANY slider off I done. Woo.

Box out, pitch and get ready for linestretch and open canopy. Also use a small PC. I used a 42 on a roughly 8 second delay. Positive opening.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AK_-_op2TUU

Andy Copland,
S&TA of the entire world
1338

People aint made of nothin' but water and shit.

Until morale improves, the beatings will continue.

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Man up and take a few spankers, you'll figure it out eventually. Ditch the sail slider though as it's rarely ever used in any BASE, in fact im yet to see one. All about the packjob.

Roll the shit out of the 3 cells either side of the centre cell, get that slider nice and tight and get the primary stow on. Good to go.

People always say "i wanna do slider up because I don't want hard openings associated with slider down jumps" but let me tell ya, a good slider up opening has rocked my world way more than ANY slider off I done. Woo.

Box out, pitch and get ready for linestretch and open canopy. Also use a small PC. I used a 42 on a roughly 8 second delay. Positive opening.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AK_-_op2TUU

Andy Copland,
S&TA of the entire world



+1

mesh slider will work fine. Use direct/indirect slider control, roll the nose the way described above.

Or like dave said if you are really worried, do a couple short delays first and see how it opens.
BASE 1384

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What are the pros and cons of taking a freepacked pack job to terminal? How bad is it and can it be done?

yes its a base canopy so i will be using a tailpocket.



So, you're asking if a freepacked BASE canopy can be taken to terminal?

Uh, yeah, I think that's been done once or twice...:P
Do you want to have an ideagasm?

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What are the pros and cons of taking a freepacked pack job to terminal? How bad is it and can it be done?

yes its a base canopy so i will be using a tailpocket.



So, you're asking if a freepacked BASE canopy can be taken to terminal?

Uh, yeah, I think that's been done once or twice...:P


Don't bullshit the man, everyone knows its a sure way to make gear and vertebrae explode.

The secret to terminal openings is making sure its done on a hot day with low air pressure, this causes a softer opening due to the air being thinner, combine with a really good track and its even better. A good tracker slows down his vertical descent to the 90's.

So hot day, track hard and its a 100% garuntee'd soft opening, simply physics.
1338

People aint made of nothin' but water and shit.

Until morale improves, the beatings will continue.

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Careful Andy. Someone might not know better and actually try that.



Then apparently I don't know any better!:P

Maybe one day I'll find out that what I think are nice openings are actually vicious spankers and stop doing it, but for now at least I'm pretty happy.
Do you want to have an ideagasm?

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Tailpocket? I either a) don't understand what a tailpocket has to do with free-packing or, b) I don't understand what you guys consider a free-pack is. Explanation, please?



If you have access to a BASE or CRW canopy, take a peek at it.

I'll try steal a picture and attach it here, but the amazing picture I created in Paint will hopefully describe it well enough for now.

The tail pocket is a Velcro closed pouch on the very center of top skin of the trailing edge.

Dark Green is the seam on the trailing edge.
Neon Green is the center cell.
White. Is the tail pocket. The dotted line in the center is a sew line.

Red: Hook Velcro
Blue: Pile Velcro

Red side is sewn to the canopy, the blue side is a flap that closes over. Blue mates with red to make the pocket.

The brown is a rubber band. It's the primary stow.

After the canopy is layed down and skinnied up, take a several inch bight of line and stow it in the rubber band. Stuff it under the tail pocket indicated in grey. The edge where the grey is isn't sewn down so it creates a pocket for the line bight.

The lines get figure 8 folded and enclosed in the pocket much like a freebag.

Edit: Here's a packing manual that shows a tail pocket

1.9 MB
Look on page 27 through 29 <== Click
My grammar sometimes resembles that of magnetic refrigerator poetry... Ghetto

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